Summary and Key Points: President Donald Trump has announced Boeing as the winner of the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) contract, naming the future 6th-generation stealth fighter the F-47.
-Scheduled for the 2030s, the F-47 promises unprecedented speed, stealth, AI-driven sensors, computing power, and air dominance capabilities.
-This “family-of-systems” jet will coordinate closely with loyal-wingman drone aircraft.
-Although the program faced recent cost and feasibility concerns, Trump’s decision signifies its critical importance for future US air superiority.
-The manned fighter will leverage AI-driven copilot systems, combining rapid machine processing with human intuition and decision-making, ensuring dominance in complex, contested combat environments against China and Russia.
F-47 Revealed: Boeing Wins Contract for US Air Force’s 6th-Generation NGAD Fighter
In an announcement that may one day be regarded as a historic leap forward in the realm of US air combat power, President Donald Trump announced that the new, stealthy Next Generation Air Dominance 6th-Gen fighter jet will again come to life — and be ready for war operations in the 2030s.
Stating that US military generals named it the F-47, Trump said, “It’s something the likes that no one has seen before” while announcing that Aerospace giant Boeing has won the contract to build the new aircraft.
The F-47 Is Born
The decision is a massive move in the world of air power dominance, as the fate of the NGAD had been lingering in a haze of uncertainty.
Prototypes and demonstrators of the NGAD have been airborne for several years now, and the effort has gained substantial momentum.
Initial conceptual work and subsystem prototyping on the NGAD goes back many years.
While the program is largely “black” or secret for national security reasons, many anticipate the new platform will incorporate paradigm-changing levels of speed, stealth, computing, sensing and air dominance power.
Trump’s announcement could be interpreted as a resurrection of sorts, given that former Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall “paused” the program in recent months for essentially cost reasons.
There was debate about affordability and the realistic prospect of building a new fleet of unmanned systems capable of performing the operations anticipated for NGAD.
Lost in a cloudy debate, the future of NGAD lingered in a mist of uncertainty .. until Trump’s announcement.
Breakthrough Technologies
While specific technological systems and mission objectives for the NGAD will likely not be available for public discussion, military leaders have commented publicly that the 6th-generation fighter will be a “family-of-systems” wherein manned fighter jets operate groups of loyal wingman Collaborative Combat Aircraft drones.
It is also widely anticipated that the NGAD will operate more as a high-speed, highly maneuverable next-generation F-22 than a multirole F-35-type fighter.
This means the new aircraft will likely have unprecedented speed and stealth and a suite of paradigm-changing sensors, computers and weapons.
It is virtually certain that the NGAD will be greatly powered by AI-enabled systems that are increasingly capable of gathering, organizing, and analyzing vast pools of information from otherwise incompatible pools of sensor-aggregated information.
Why the Boeing F-47 NGAD Is Going Forward
The decision to move forward with a manned NGAD suggests that the Trump administration and top weapons developers at the Pentagon believe there is still a large operational need to have “human” pilots in a stealth jet.
Pentagon leaders have performed many tests and experiments with manned fighter jets dogfighting against AI-operated fighters for years. At times, AI-enabled systems have outperformed human-piloted planes.
Yet, nonetheless, many weapons developers believe there are many circumstances best managed by a human decision-maker.
Certainly, AI-enabled systems and autonomy can perform many functions exponentially faster and, in many cases, better than humans.
F-47 Fighter from U.S. Air Force.
However, the prevailing thought among senior weapons developers and Pentagon scientists is that the optimal approach to air combat is effectively ” blending” manned and unmanned platforms together.
Extending this reasoning, the thinking is that AI-enabled machines can perform critical procedural and analytical functions in milliseconds in support of human decision-makers positioned to leverage key attributes unique to human cognition and decision-making.
AI-Copilot
One possibility under exploration in recent years with the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) has been to fly a manned fighter jet with an AI-enabled computerized co-pilot.
The AFRL did this with an AI copilot called Artuu flying with a manned pilot to leverage the best of each to optimize mission success.
AI-enabled systems can, of course, perform many procedural and analytical functions in milliseconds. However, many more subjective attributes are unique to human cognition that computers would likely be ill-equipped to replicate.
What about emotions, imagination, intuition and other less tangible elements of human consciousness?
About the Author: Kris Osborn
Kris Osborn is the President of Warrior Maven – Center for Military Modernization. Osborn previously served at the Pentagon as a highly qualified expert in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army—Acquisition, Logistics & Technology. Osborn has also worked as an anchor and on-air military specialist at national TV networks. He has appeared as a guest military expert on Fox News, MSNBC, The Military Channel, and The History Channel. He also has a Masters Degree in Comparative Literature from Columbia University.
